Microsoft wants high school girls around the world to develop their understanding of Artificial Intelligence. To achieve this, the company is introducing the DigiGirlz AI Class in partnership with Avanade and Accenture.
The program gives girls access to a collection of tutorials, games and technological resources. Designed in a way that it equips them with the skills and knowledge to apply the technology in real life.
Participants of the program will be treated to workshops led by industry experts. They will also receive help from mentors at Microsoft, Avanade and Accenture to develop their own projects.
Dubbed “Alice envisions the future“, it promotes endless curiosity and determination. Microsoft aims DigiGirlz AI Class will help “close the gap in STEM fields”. By “giving girls the right tools to discover the possibilities that await them“.
All high school girls worldwide can participate in the program. You don’t need any coding experience to begin.
The various workshops include Fundamentals of Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Deep learning & Neural Networks and AI for Good.
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Droppa, South Africa on-demand delivery digital platform service expands its service offering with the launch of “Droppa Express”. Bringing express delivery for light-weight items within a 25 km radius in just 24 hours.
The express service will cater for the delivery of goods such as food, parcels, books, stationery and other smaller items under 25 kg. Promising an affordable rate, it will be available in Pretoria, Johannesburg, Cape Town and Durban.
Delivery bookings can be made through the company website droppa.co.za. Or app which is available as a free download on Android and IOS platforms.
“Droppa is continuously looking to enhance current service offerings. Or to introduce new ones that meet the requirements of our customer base across South Africa’s four major cities,” says Khathu Mufamadi, Droppa CEO.
Droppa moves into essential services
Earlier this month, the on-demand e-hailing company announced it is pivoting in response to the new Covid-19 lockdown imposed by the government.
The company’s original operating model allows patrons and businesses to request a truck/bakkie for all furniture removals and logistics, also operates in Cape Town, Johannesburg, Pretoria and Durban.
Droppa now offers its services to businesses rendering essential services. Such as retail stores, warehouses, fresh produce farms and medical suppliers. It will also be made available to members of the public who require essential goods delivered to them.
In a similar way to Uber, Droppa does not own trucks. Instead, it has driver-partners that have registered their vehicles. Thus empowering and providing employment opportunities for many South Africans.
“The Covid-19 pandemic poses an unprecedented threat to businesses worldwide. Companies must react in different ways to ensure business continuity, improve the resilience of their supply chain, or pivot to innovate ways to generate revenue” concludes Mufamadi.
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Standard Bank is offering a free online Microsoft Digital Literacy Course to all South Africans in partnership with Pioneering Solutions Studio.
The courses focus on generic ICT skills and concepts. How to use a computer and the Internet. keeping yourself and your computer safe online. As well as how to use the most common Microsoft productivity software applications (Word, Excel and PowerPoint).
The online course is open to all South Africans during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. You also don’t need to have a Standard Bank account to use the platform. It explores a range of digital skills and practices over four key modules. Providing the learner with the ability to utilise technology to interact with the world around them.
To register, learners will need a device, such as a phone, tablet or computer, with internet connectivity, a valid email address, together with their South African ID number. Learners that do not have an email address can register for a free Microsoft Outlook email account from the platform. Upon completion they will be issued with a Microsoft Imagine Academy certificate. This certificate will allow South African’s to claim recognition of prior learning in Digital Literacy at any institution of higher learning.
According to United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), there are nearly 1.4 billion students globally who can’t attend school and university as a result of COVID-19. Millions of people around the world are also unable to work as a result of quarantine and lockdowns.
In its latest Global Shapers Report, the World Economic Forum referred to online learning as the future of education. StatsSA’s most recent Labour Force Survey shows upskilling courses significantly increase the likelihood of employment. With more employers favouring employees that have had continuous development as professionals.
In today’s digital world, nearly every career requires digital communication at some point. Standard Bank believes that equipping yourself with the skills to effectively and responsibly find, evaluate, communicate and share online content is key to your future. “You need a certain level of digital literacy to turn on your computer. So that you can connect with loved ones but require different skills to locate and complete an online job application. Standard Bank wants you to be digital literacy savvy, whether you bank with us or not”.
The course will continue to be available post the lockdown period. To learn more about the Microsoft Digital Literacy course – visit learn section on the Standard Bank website.
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Microsoft is giving Kenya courts six months free access to its Office 365 collaboration platform dubbed Teams as social distancing rules take root in the wake of Covid-19.
Open court sessions are suspended to limit exposure to the virus. Kenya courts are therefore relying on technology to continue operations and avoid backlogs.
Chief Justice David Maraga notes the court’s activities involve an extensive exchange of paperwork which risks the spread of the virus.
While it is prudent to upscale court activities it will not be wise to have open court sessions at this time. This doesn’t mean the courts have closed down,court operations have never and will never be closed. The proceedings can only be conducted remotely through increased use of technology. Except in exceptional circumstances, all pleadings are being filed and served electronically. All other matters including the delivery of judgements shall be handled through video conferencing or email. I want to announce Microsoft has donated the application of Microsoft Teams for use for six months free of charge.
Global pandemic Covid-19 has changed the way most people work. Governments are issuing lockdowns, curfews, cessation of movements and restricting the number of individuals at gatherings to curb the spread of the deadly virus. This has compelled businesses and organizations including courts to rethink their work model.
Technology companies such as Microsoft, Facebook, Zoom and Google have stepped in to help companies wade uncertain times as they seek to stay afloat. Most of the tech firms are offering video conferencing, remote and team collaboration tools free of charge during this period. Microsoft announced it is making Teams – which comes bundled in Office 365 – free for everyone.
“During this extraordinary time, it is clear that software, has a huge role to play across every industry and around the world“, notes Microsoft CEO, Satya Nadella. Speaking about the company’s unique role as a platform and tools provider during this global pandemic.
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Cloud security is a fundamentally new landscape for many companies. While many of the security principles remain the same as on-premises, the implementation is often very different. This overview provides a snapshot of five best practices for cloud security: identity and access control, security posture management, apps and data security, threat protection and network security.
1. Strengthen access control
Traditional security practices are not enough to defend against modern security attacks. Therefore, the modern security practice is to “assume breach”: protect as though the attacker has breached the network perimeter. Today, users work from many locations with multiple devices and apps. The only constant is user identity, which is why it is the new security control plane.
Institute multifactor authentication
Provide another layer of security by requiring two or more of the following authentication methods: • Something you know (typically a password) • Something you have (a trusted device that is not easily duplicated, like a phone) • Something you are (biometrics)
Take advantage of conditional access
Master the balance between security and productivity by factoring how a resource is accessed into an access control decision. Implement automated access control decisions for accessing your cloud apps that are based on conditions.
Operate in a zerotrust model
Verify the identity of everything and anything trying to authenticate or connect before granting access.
2. Improve security posture
With more and more recommendations and security vulnerabilities identified, it is harder to triage and prioritise response. Make sure that you have the tools you need to assess your current environments and assets and identify potential security issues.
Improve your current posture
Use a tool like Secure Score in Azure Security Centre to understand and improve your security posture by implementing best practices.
Educate stakeholders
Share progress on your secure score with stakeholders to demonstrate the value that you are providing to the organisation as you improve organizational security.
Collaborate with your DevOps team on policies
Modernise your security information and event management (SIEM) To get out of reactive mode, you must work with your DevOps teams in advance to apply key security policies at the beginning of the engineering cycle as secure DevOps.
3. Secure apps and data
Protect data, apps and infrastructure through a layered, defence-in-depth strategy across identity, data, hosts and networks.
Encryption
Encrypt data at rest and in transit. Consider encrypting data at use with confidential computing technologies.
Follow security best practices
Ensure your open source dependencies do not have vulnerabilities. Additionally, train your developers in security best practices such as Security Development Lifecycle (SDL)
Share the responsibility
When a company operates primarily on-premises, it owns the whole stack and is responsible for its own security. Depending on how you use the cloud, your responsibilities change, with some responsibilities moving to your cloud provider. IaaS: for applications running in virtual machines, more of the burden is on the customer to ensure that both the application and OS are secure. PaaS: as you move to cloud-native PaaS, cloud providers like Microsoft will take more of the security responsibility at the OS level itself. SaaS: at the SaaS level, more responsibility shifts away from the customer. See the shared responsibility model.
4. Mitigate threats
Operational security posture – protect, detect and respond – should be informed by unparalleled security intelligence to identify rapidly evolving threats early so you can respond quickly.
Enable detection for all resource types
Ensure threat detection is enabled for virtual machines, databases, storage and IoT. Azure Security Centre has builtin threat detection that supports all Azure resource types.
Integrate threat intelligence
Use a cloud provider that integrates threat intelligence, providing the necessary context, relevance and prioritization for you to make faster, better and more proactive decisions.
Modernise your security information and event management (SIEM)
Consider a cloud-native SIEM that scales with your needs, uses AI to reduce noise and requires no infrastructure.
5. Protect the network
We’re in a time of transformation for network security. As the landscape changes, your security solutions must meet the challenges of the evolving threat landscape and make it more difficult for attackers to exploit networks.
Keep strong firewall protection
Setting up your firewall is still important, even with identity and access management. Controls need to be in place to protect the perimeter, detect hostile activity and build your response. A web application firewall (WAF) protects web apps from common exploits like SQL injection and cross-site scripting.
Enable Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) Protection
Protect web assets and networks from malicious traffic targeting application and network layers, to maintain availability and performance, while containing operating costs.
Create a microsegmented network
A flat network makes it easier for attackers to move laterally. Familiarise yourself with concepts like virtual networking, subnet provisioning and IP addressing. Use micro-segmentation, and embrace a whole new concept of micro perimeters to support zero trust networking.
As more business move their operations to the cloud here is what to know about the hybrid cloud.
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Master Cohorts in conjunction with Microsoft and Decoded Africa present a free online data science on Azure masterclass. Scheduled to take place on the 25th of April at11am EAT. Join the event and learn how you can leverage Microsoft Azure as a Data Scientist.
Master Cohorts shares the master data science classes is an initiative to use different resources together as a community to learn Data Science. It also provides a platform to learn, mentor, socialize and collaborate.
The program will touch on all levels. From beginner to deep dives. The event outline includes:
– Introductions. – About Decoded by Max Musau – Day in the life of a Data Scientist by John Mugendi and – Azure for Data Science
Click to register and participate in the Data science on Azure masterclass.
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